1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system capable of sharing assembly data between a computer aided design (CAD) computer system, such as Autodesk.RTM.'s AutoCAD.RTM., and a manufacturing computer system, such as ProfitKey International's Rapid Response Manufacturing.RTM..
2. Description of Related Art
CAD computer application programs, such as Autodesk's AutoCAD.RTM., are used by engineers and draftspersons for designing and drawing, among other things, assemblies, such as a nut, bolt and washer assembly. An assembly usually consists of components, such as the nut, the bolt and the washer, but also may include subassemblies consisting of a number of related components. Attribute data, such as part number and description, are associated with the components, subassemblies and assemblies.
Generally, the designer will draw an assembly including these components and subassemblies. In particular, a rendition of each component or subassembly is predrawn and saved in a file separate from the drawing file. The set of separate part files would comprise a library of available parts. The designer then selects the component he needs from the library and reconfigures it to meet the design requirements of the assembly.
CAD systems, however, have a number of drawbacks. For example, CAD systems generally do not (1) provide means for organizing a library of commonly used parts or of created parts, (2) provide a means for retrieving drawings by any other data type than their filenames, (3) provide means for automatically assigning part numbers to components and assemblies, (4) provide means for comparing existing part descriptions or searching using part descriptions, and (5) means for insuring the filename matches the information in the title block. Moreover, CAD applications generally experience long time delays when searching for drawing files in directories containing large number of files since they rely on the operating system and do not use a database. Further, when combining a small file to a larger assembly file, such as when inserting a block into a drawing under edit, the smaller file is represented by an object and is therefore uneditable. If editing of that object is required, the object must first be converted to its original construction, causing all corresponding attribute data to be irretrievably lost and thus can no longer be accounted for in the CAD system.
Manufacturing computer systems, such as ProfitKey International's Rapid Response Manufacturing.RTM. system, use assembly data from the assembly designed by the engineers to allow manufacturing personnel to plan, schedule and control the manufacturing of the assembly. It also allows manufacturers to manage and control inventory, such as the required components and subassemblies, and do other various manufacturing-related tasks, such as cost estimating and purchasing.
The assembly data is entered, usually by hand, into the manufacturing system. One known system, Innovative Dynamics PKBOM, extracts data from an AutoCAD.RTM. system assembly, specifically the part number and description and the relation between the part numbers, and manipulates this data so that it can be imported into the ProfitKey manufacturing system. This system, however, requires the operator of the CAD system to be intimate with the capabilities of the CAD system, and is dependent upon the proper operation of the CAD system.
In general, in CAD systems, parts are synonymous with a drawing or a file. Thus, this system cannot provide means for determining whether a part exists, means for previewing a part, automatic assignment of part numbers to the components and assemblies, comparing descriptions of components, or the transfer of any assembly data other than the part number and description. Moreover, PKBOM disadvantageously requires that the user manually save each drawing, update the title block and separately log onto to the manufacturing computer system to import the data.